Coffee Enema Common Errors and Trouble Shooting Tips

Coffee Enema is not a complicated tool to incorporate into your life when beginning the journey into developing a “detox lifestyle.” HOWEVER, there are a few details that matter when you are doing these. The devil is in the details! 

Let’s look at a few things that I have personally been guilty of doing and that I have come across when walking others through their health journey:

Common Errors or Issues:

1. Inserting the bucket tubing into the colon (the tips that come in the enema kits or the direct silicone tubing).  This tubing is not flexible and can damage the colon if inserted. Use the red rubber (or silicone if allergic to latex) catheter on the end of the tubing for the safest enema. This also ensures that you get the solution to the location that is desired for optimum uptake by the portal vein – (8 inches into the rectum). 
2. Not rinsing hydrogen peroxide from cleaning. We recommend cleaning the tubing and the bag with hydrogen peroxide to sanitize the equipment.  But it is ABSOLUTELY necessary to follow this with rinsing with hot water, then ice cold water. Hot water to ensure you eliminate the hydrogen peroxide from the tubing and bag/bucket. The ice cold water to follow is to prevent the build up and development of mold in the equipment! That is the LAST THING you need or want!
3. Using bleach to clean the equipment. Bleach is bad, y’all! No really. It is not any good at truly killing the things we want to disinfect and its terribly caustic to both material and the individual using it. It is also almost impossible to rinse off of your equipment when you clean with it.  You don’t want bleach remnants in the colon. Don’t use it.
4. Continuing to do a coffee enema when you are struggling with adrenal issues.  If you find you have adrenal issues, slow down or stop the CE until the adrenals are healing or you have implemented intentional mitochondrial support into the treatment plan. You may need to focus on some herbal enemas to support the inflammation of the gut and to promote the release of GABA in the body and enhance the parasympathetic (rest and digest) side of your nervous system. If you are working through adrenal issues, you can do CE, but you need to be very intentional about supporting the health of your mitochondria (the root of the adrenal fatigue is mitochondrial dysfunction). 
5. Giving up because you can’t hold the CE for 12-15  minutes.  Holding any amount of time is better than none.  It can take a while to get used to working through the natural peristalsis that occurs when liquid is inserted into the colon. Tips to  improving retention holding time: 
   • Make sure there is no air in the tubing prior to inserting the liquid. 
   • Make sure the temperature is not too cold! 
   • Lay on your right side. 
6. Not able to do a bowel movement on your own. This can occur when you first start doing CE, but is not a lasting phenomenon and  should resolve itself over time. I often recommend taking magnesium daily when you first start using CE routinely. This will often mitigate the short term peristalsis issues and allow you to continue with normal movement of the bowels. Also, be sure that you are following the guidelines noted in our how-to section, including taking electrolytes and the proper binders following CE. 
7. Holding longer than 15 minutes. Longer does not mean better.  There’s is a fine line between just enough detox and too much, especially at first. That said, once you have moved through a properly ordered detox, you will be able to hold longer without too many side effects. I have been know to do my CE, get in the shower and run to an appointment when I know I need to do the treatment, but literally can’t carve out 15 mins to do it…. So, see, it’s not impossible, even if your schedule is slammed! (Of course, I am not fully benefitting in from the treatment in this situation, as I am not in the proper position for optimal absorption- Right side down).
8. Using freeze dried coffee beverage. Yikes! This is no better than doing a coffee flavored water enema, there is absolutely zero palmitic acids in this approach. Palmitic acids are the magic that triggers the glutathione release, bile release and peristalsis. Use organic, light to medium roast Arabica coffee.
9. Making the coffee in a coffee maker or French Press. Nope. Don’t do that either. The cooking process in our protocol releases the oils (with the palmitic acids) from the coffee.  Paper filters just absorb the important oil, so don’t used those! French Press is OK to FILTER the coffee, but it must be cooked in a pot as described in the how-to section. 
10. Using tap water, (even if it is purified from a really good whole house filter), “purified water” or spring water. The ideal water used to cook and mix your coffee enema is DISTILLED WATER as it guarantees the most pure, toxin-free water. Whole house water filters will remove some of the top offending toxins, but are not able to remove all, including radioactive elements commonly found in water. 
11. Burning the colon with a hot coffee solution. Ouch!!  We recommend the coffee enema solution be about body temp (100 degrees) or a bit higher.  It is possible to burn the colon. One option is using a fancy laser temp monitor to check the solution before inserting. Another option is to check the solution on the tender skin of your inner forearm or wrist (like you would do for warming baby milk).
12. Putting boiling water in the bucket or the tubing to clean it. Boiling water degrades the plastic.  Hot soapy (clean herbal based soap) water is sufficient along with a little bit of diluted hydrogen peroxide.